Happy Halloween! ★

Thank goodness, Emersyn is back in full gear today. She got up happy (and dry) and was very excited to put on her costume for daycare.

Well, her kind-of-costume... I'm not crazy, so I was not sending my toddler in her full costume to daycare when they were going to be having all their festivities. Not a chance. I did however deck her out in the ladybug leotard that I found. It's really part of a costume that has the tutu, but being as that would give Emersyn frostbite trick-or-treating in Maryland, I opted for the ginormous Carter's costume and just got the leotard part of the other one (for super cheap too). She got to wear the leotard to gymnastics ("my nastics") this weekend and then we layered it today for daycare. So she still got to dress up for Character Day, but there was no chance of ruining tonight's costume.

This is Emersyn before we left for daycare... **((*** After nap time (isn't she cute on her little cot?!?!) they had a little Harvest Party with some goodies for the kids... **((( We got home, ordered pizza and waited for the fun to begin. Patrick and Annie came over with Gabbie and Dominic, Cameron came with my parents' and Emersyn was on cloud 9 with her "cuh-inzz" to go trick or treating with her. The cutest thing was that Emersyn and Gabbie were the exact same ladybug, and Emersyn loved that! So here's some "getting ready" pictures... ****♥What a crew!♥ ****And we're off... ***My Love Bird... she was so tired out. ***We were only out for about an hour, maybe a little less, but the kids were actually happy to be back at the house. Emersyn would've fallen asleep right there on the front step if we left her alone for more than 5 seconds. I mean literally she was starting to nod off while Gabbie was pulling candy out of our bowl, that was in Emersyn's lap. You know she's tired when Emersyn doesn't take every opportunity to love on a baby! ***&&&After she gave almost everyone hugs - she tried to get up to give Annie a hug, but didn't even make it all the way to standing but she did lean in to everyone when they bent down to hug her - we got one last picture of Emersyn in her cute costume before heading in to bed. ***(((( It was such a great day! Emersyn made it yet another whole day without an accident, so she should be getting a special treat tomorrow. I will say we put a pull-up on her for trick-or-treating, but she was actually dry when we took everything off her. So that was another little bonus for the day. And having all the kids at our house just made it such a great time. It really brings back the memories I have growing up, when we'd all go to my cousin's house and trick or treat there with all the cousins. It's nice to see Emersyn getting that same type of experience... especially watching Cameron and Dominic take care of her. That was priceless!

Well, as always there is seriously a ton more pictures from tonight. This even got its own album, so head over to www.theswaderfarmily.shutterfly.com to see all fun from today!! Happy Halloween!!! &#9733

Sick Sunday :(

Well, today Emersyn got her second ever fever. It was only 100.6 but it's literally the second fever she's ever had... even with all her ear infections.

Emersyn went to the doctors' office on Friday just to make sure that her cold really wasn't anythign more. It's not. She does have an ear infection in both ears, but they said that those are because of the cold not the reason behind it. So we continued to give her the ear drops (which we were already doing since we saw the infections) and benadryl at night to help dry the gunk up a bit.

That's been working okay, but today she was super cuddly and just wanted to be held. When we got to my parents' house, she was warmer than normal but she continued to get hotter even though she wasn't sweating or doing anything. So, we took her temperture and she had a little fever. A dose of tylenol and she was totally back to normal...

Now, it's not like I like when Emersyn's sick or want her to feel bad, much less actually be sick. But... well, it is awful nice when she's cuddly. I mean, I love just sitting with her, holding her and relaxing. She's just so independent now and so grown up, that you don't get to do that. We get to snuggle up a little bit at bedtime when we relax and watch a show, but that's it. So I do have to admit that when the tylenol kicked in, I was actually a little sad knowing that I wasn't getting any more cuddle time today. But, yes, overall I really am glad she's feeling better. And, no, I'm not just saying that. I like seeing Emersyn in all her glory, playing and laughing like crazy. It's a beautiful thing. I just wish I could hold her sometimes, sitting all curled up together even for a few minutes.

Anyways, you can clearly tell from these couple pictures today that she wasn't feeling very well... and, yes, that's actually Emersyn sitting on my lap while I crochet. If that doesn't scream "she's sick" then I don't know what does! **(*****

Silly Silly Bird

You know how Emersyn goes to gymnastics? Well apparently, as she's learning names and the whole possession thing, our darling daughter has decided it's not "gym-nastics"... it's "my nastics". She even told Chris "not Jim's, it mine". LMAO!!

Before going to her 'nastics this morning, Emersyn got really bundled up since it's abnormally cold here right now. She thought the hat and mitten (just that one) were really cool though, so she had to rock them while "cooking"... **&^**** And then it was off to gymnastics... **&%*** A little later today it actually started snowing. Yeah, it doesn't snow in fricking Maryland in October, so that says how cold it is today. Anyway, it wasn't really much at all, but we took the opportunity to try on Emersyn's snow pants from last year (we need a new pair after all) and see what she thought of that white stuff. She lasted about 5 seconds before she asked to go back in and she downright refused to wear gloves or touch the snow (slush). &&**#*** On a totally random note, we also have this little gem of a video... See, Dobie has a little nickname since he's such a huge Boxer. We like to call him Chunker or Chunkerbutt sometimes and, well, Emersyn kind of made it a battle cry today. You do have to turn the volume up a little bit since she's not really close to the camera, but it's hysterical...

So all the pictures and the new video are at www.theswaderfarmily.shutterfly.com so you can see all our silly adventures and lovable clips. Head over and see all the pictures, watch some "old" videos, have a little laugh.

Our Accident-Free-Pumpkin-Carving-Day

Hopefully Emersyn going all day without an accident today is a sign of things to come, and a sign that yesterday was a fluke. Only time will tell, but she woke up dry this morning and stayed "dry" all day long. One can hope, though. One can hope.

The most amazing thing is that Emersyn didn't even get distracted with carving pumpkins and have an accident. We were nervous that she's lose focus, but she proved us wrong.
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